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Limited inservice education. The long-term nature of the technical assistance required for reform poses a political problem in that most of the external means of providing this help were established for shorter time periods than required to do the job. Apparently, this inservice education and related assistance were based on the assumption that the goal could be attained more quickly than in reality is possible. In many of the cases, inservice education which was helpful in implementing the reforms ended before teachers had received all the help needed. In both middle school science cases, for example, valued inservice education was provided over a period of a couple of years, yet was terminated before many of the teachers were ready to carry on on their own. Similar situations exist in most of the other cases.
Teachers need ongoing, long-term support that goes beyond what is typically provided. The needed support is not just in the technical arena, but extends into the cultural arena as well. Political steps are needed to insure the availability of the required technical assistance and its incorporation with the process of addressing related values and beliefs. Important steps must be taken to insure that important cultural aspects--i.e., relevant values and beliefs--are addressed adequately in this inservice education.
Parental resistance. In a number of cases there is strong resistance to the reforms from parents. While this resistance has its roots in parents' values and beliefs--the cultural dimension--it clearly is a political issue as well. In many cases the intensity of parents' opposition was sufficient to significantly hinder the reform process. In one math site, for example, the administration's approach to negative parents was one of compromise resulting in the de facto tracking of students. It also can constrain the work of teachers as seen at another site.
Finally, perceptions of community expectations being counter to reform efforts serve to paralyze the teachers' forward-looking efforts.
Such situations raise questions about the appropriate response to such pressures, including the possibility of modifying the reforms in response to real and/or perceived problems with them, and the possibility of educating parents so they can address these issues from a position that is as fully informed as possible.
For whatever reason, this resistance was strongest from parents whose children were most able and successful by traditional indicators of success in school.
Probably the students that had the most difficulty with this role were the students that are perceived as talented ... [T]he students who are really capable or have been really capable in the past in science where they had worksheets and learned vocabulary words find themselves not nearly as successful now because they are having to think and interpret and reason where they didn't have to do that before ... [T]hey go through a period there where they think, "This is the pits! You're making me do things that I don't know how to do."
Unresolved teacher conflicts. In most of our cases, teachers had a fairly high degree of autonomy and the freedom to make important decisions about how they would conduct education--both individually and as a department or team. In this context, however, one also found conflict as teachers engaged in their personal struggles to make change and deliberated with their colleagues as to what changes should be made. Given the reform context, such conflicts are to be expected--probably even desired--since such conflict is an inevitable part of change. The issue is not the presence of conflict, but what steps are taken to resolve it. In a few instances the means of resolving conflicts were inadequate and the result was tensions that inhibited progress on the reforms. Some examples of "counter-reform" convictions of teachers in the math sites are informative.
Memorization and manipulation of facts and formulas was good for some kids, and the practice of memorization through the study of formulas would prevent kids from getting lazy, according to these teachers.
... most of the teachers are concerned that their students are not learning the basic skills, that they not getting enough "math".
This pull between the "back to the basics" emphasis on factual knowledge and the emphasis on conceptual knowledge is an unresolved struggle in the mathematics department at this site.
By the spring of the 1992-93 year, the mathematics department at the school had fractured into three camps of roughly equal size. The "interactive" teachers, including the department coordinator and the two teacher-leaders, were committed to the INT program and more generally to the changes it embodied. The "traditional" teacher disagreed with aspects of the INT program and its effects on the department's offerings; their dissatisfaction had been building and they had become more openly critical. A third group of teachers had taken positions between these extremes. They liked certain aspects of the new approach, were unsure about others, and were taking a wait-and-see position.
While conflict about such matters generally had been more fully resolved in the science sites, it was an issue there as well, as illustrated by one middle school science site.
The amount of science content especially concerned Linda. She said that there were some things that the students had to know, like the symbols for the elements, and the only way to know these things was to memorize them ... Two of the teachers felt that the philosophy which provided the basis of the reform program conflicted with their own personal philosophy of teaching, their teaching style, and/or the practicality of the situation--such as the availability of materials.
This apparent conflict over educational issues, however, is highly interactive with the availability of teacher support for making change. In the case of this science site, there were many indicators of inadequate help--through inservice education or collaborative working relationships with other teachers--for teachers in their individual struggles with these issues.
The 8th grade teachers were concerned with what they perceived to be a lack of organization and preplanning during their first year of implementation. Other teachers attributed their discomfort to the teachers' unfamiliarity and struggle with something new. The teachers who had been with the project for two or three years stated that they saw a big improvement in this area after they had been through it.
In some of our cases such conflicts largely have been resolved, but nevertheless, they are somewhat of an issue in all of the cases. The steps required to address such situations are fairly well understood, judging by the research literature on the issue. Putting such knowledge into practice, of course, often is difficult. The message from our cases is that such issues are important and steps should be taken to address them. In that sense they are a political matter; resources must be allocated and steps taken for the purpose of conflict resolution and assistance in addressing the related technical issues.
Lack of resources. In our cases the lack of equipment and other facilities was rarely a significant direct barrier. Somehow, the resources were found to acquire the essentials. In an indirect manner, however, resources often were a significant problem when their lack resulted in members of a department not being physically located in classrooms next to each other. As will be discussed in more detail later, collaboration among teachers was a highly important factor in these reform endeavors. In cases where teachers were not located near each other, an isolation resulted that often was a significant barrier to collaboration. One example was a middle school science site.
Regarding the 6th grade pilot teacher (Sara) and two 7th grade teachers: "These three teachers, Sara, Paul and Connie, felt they had 'ownership' of the program and felt comfortable with making changes because 'the curriculum was written by teachers just like me..in fact, I was one of the teachers.' They also had classrooms that were in close proximity to each other which facilitates collaboration ... Due to the middle school structure they also had a more difficult time finding time to work with other science teachers, especially when their rooms were physically removed from other science teachers ... During my discussions with Sara [the lead teacher] she was not aware of what the other science teachers were doing in her building and teachers new to the reform had the feeling that 'they were going it alone.'"
Justice and fairness. There is a barrier to reform that grows out of the goal of justice and fairness for all, a goal generally expressed as the elimination of tracking and ability grouping, or in a specific subject area, as "science for all students," for example, rather than just for the college-bound students.
Because of the differences in judgment about what constitutes fairness, however, it may be difficult to say how this goal, or its absence, is a barrier to reform. It is highly interrelated with the cultural dimension. In communities where the elimination of ability grouping or the absence of special classes for gifted students have become contentious issues, this matter is very much a political issue. It relates to how decisions are made within a school and how conflict in a community is resolved. It also may be related to the cultural dimension, in that it is highly intertwined with teachers--and parents--beliefs about the value of various learnings--what and for whom--and beliefs about what learning outcomes are most important for various future goals--such as college--and what constitutes the most effective way to learn.
By and large, the goals of the reformers have been ones of fairness and justice. The barrier arises when conflict occurs at a given site--between professionals and/or between professionals and parents--over what constitutes fairness for various categories of students. To a large extent, this specific barrier will be removed when the desired progress is made on fostering positive political processes and addressing value and belief issues within the cultural arena. In doing so, it must be emphasized again that shifting from traditional to reformed educational practices creates numerous dilemmas for teachers and achieving the desired reforms demands great effort and commitment expended over a substantial period of time.
The cultural dimension. From many perspectives, this section on the cultural dimension of the barriers to reform constitutes the focal point of the cross-site analysis of the cases. It is central because it deals with fundamental values and beliefs about education held by the people involved--values and beliefs that are at the heart of their commitment to a traditional or reformed outlook on educational practice. If there is a consensual set of values and beliefs among the teachers that is consistent with the reforms, this barrier is essentially eliminated. In fact, it is now a powerful force for change in the reform direction. On the other hand, if there is no consensus,reform has a long ways to go.
If in the process of putting the reforms into practice, consistent shifts in values and beliefs occur, the reforms probably will be in place for the long term. If the parallel shifts in values and beliefs do not occur, the reforms probably will disappear as soon as the special efforts of the reform endeavor are removed from the picture.
Although presented here under the label of "culture," these values and beliefs have a strong individual as well as social component. In many cases, there is great variation among a group of teachers on these fundamental values and beliefs. In such instances, major collective changes face serious difficulty. In other instances a consensus consistent with the reform agenda exists--or as a result of working together, one emerges--and reform occurs quite rapidly.
The use of the technical and cultural dimensions in this analysis highlights a distinction between two types of barriers that may not always be easy to distinguish. As noted earlier, people providing inservice education generally focus on the technical dimension and may not attend fully to the cultural dimension, i.e., related values and beliefs of the teachers. As noted earlier also, it may be hard to determine whether or not a teacher's difficulties with a reform are due to a lack of technical knowledge and skills, or due to values and beliefs that are not consistent with the reform.
Both the technical and cultural dimensions of reform must be addressed. In fact, major progress on either one may be difficult without simultaneous progress on the other. The situation must be viewed as a system; everything connects to everything else. Change usually requires simultaneous attention to a number of factors.
As noted earlier, achieving the desired reforms demands great effort and commitment expended over a substantial period of time. A major reason is the concomitant changes in values and beliefs which are a part of the process. Particularly noteworthy is the elapsed time generally required. These changes in beliefs and values generally occur in the context of exploration and trial of new ideas and practices. This is the aspect of reform that is both most difficult and most important. One should not expect it to happen quickly. Assume that any significant change will take an extended elapsed time; any efforts for promoting change should be based on this assumption.
These attempts at change should also be expected to result in significant tensions for the participants as they wrestle with their values and beliefs. These tensions result in what we have labelled dilemmas. As they attempt to shift from traditional to reformed educational practices, teachers face many dilemmas that are not quickly resolved. Some of these dilemmas are pragmatic and logistical matters; most are grounded in the values and beliefs which are under scrutiny. Whether teachers, administrators, or parents, resistance to change commonly is grounded in values and beliefs about education that are in conflict with those in which the reforms are grounded. Some examples may be helpful.
The textbook issue revisited. It was noted earlier that the lack of a prominent role for a textbook in reform classes creates a dilemma for many teachers. Although it commonly is at least partially rooted in the practical matter of how to teach in a manner that does not depend on a textbook--the technical dimension--the tension for many teachers is more a question of their conviction that learning from a book is inherently valuable. It is an indication of their values and beliefs regarding learning.
Although I am not sure how well understood it is by the teachers themselves, as an outside observer I am persuaded that the differing opinions about the textbook reflect differences in persuasions about how a class can best be conducted to aid student learning. The extent to which teachers see knowledge as something for students to acquire versus conceptions that they must construct is reflected in their comments.
Two teachers expressed the belief that not all students learn in the same manner, and that some students may be helped if they could read about science concepts. Other teachers did not want the textbook but felt that a set of science resource books would be helpful.
Ultimately, teachers felt the SAT hanging over their head as a measurement on which their students had to be successful.
Their perception was that the [state] test did not match the SPRSE curriculum. In response, some of the teachers suspended the reform program and taught lessons from old textbooks for several weeks. They were concerned that their names would be published along with their student test scores.
Most teachers were keenly aware of the standardized tests which students had to be prepared to take as college bound seniors and in the upper level classes there was a reluctance to turn the agenda over to conceptual understanding entirely ... This pull between beliefs about the place of computational expertise and conceptual understanding in a presumed hierarchy of mathematical knowledge reappears throughout this study, whether in curriculum, assessment, or choice of materials.
For some teachers, their fear is that large-scale assessments will not change to match their new teaching approaches and classroom assessments. While there is research on this topic that should be comforting to such teachers--in that, it indicates teaching for understanding is good preparation for extant types of tests--it is not widely know among teachers.
The preparation ethic. The learning goals of the reforms are problematic for many teachers. They are committed to the "preparation ethic," the idea that the accumulation of fairly discrete knowledge and skills, rather than critical thinking skills, will prepare their students best for the next level of schooling. The big concern is often what they will "need to know" when they get to college--or in the case of middle school students, when they get to high school. Concerns about "coverage" often get in the way of teaching for depth of understanding, integration of content, and pursuit of the major themes of the content. Many of the mathematics teachers in our cases, for example believe that traditional mathematics has served their college-bound students well. Similarly, many science teachers question how well the "new" science will prepare students for college, as illustrated by these comments from Betty, a teacher who is quite firmly committed to the reforms.
They have balanced some equations, but the chemistry teacher in me still wants to see a whole unit on stoichiometry where, you know, they have balanced a whole lot of equations and they have gone through mass conversions and mass mole conversions. And because I know they are going to have to do that in college, and I guess I would feel more confident that the kids would be successful if they had to do more of that stuff here.
Betty is torn between this concern for her most able students in their future college careers, and the more middle of the road students who may succeed in the future in a way they would not have if they had been restricted to lower level tracked courses.
These illustrative teacher dilemmas are largely rooted in beliefs and values that are to some extent in conflict with those of the reforms. They also are related to a school culture that expects certain roles for students and particular forms of student work. To a large extent these roles and work are different than those promoted in the reforms. They clash with the school culture also because they demand a new level of responsibility for students--an independent responsibility often feared in the current school culture. Students need to be given a bigger part in developing this new role and definition of work expectations. The tension experienced by teachers has both technical and cultural dimensions. If students were not actively involved in defining their new role, another tension was present:
... the tension that occurred in math classes when teachers attempted to allow the process to focus on the student as constructor of their own knowledge without actively engaging students in the transformation from passive learner to active learner.
Resolving such tensions requires considerable work on the part of teachers with their students in teaching them new roles and helping them define new forms of intellectual work.
The key means for teachers to make progress on resolving such dilemmas is through collaboration with fellow teachers in the day-to-day school work context. It can have a powerful influence on teachers' values and beliefs as well as facilitate change in the technical dimension. This topic will be addressed again in our later discussion of the essential ingredients of a reform setting.
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[The Essentials of Attaining Reforms]